Manticore Life - No Escape
by julesrox
Summary: What if there was never an escape? What if Max wasn't really an X-5? What if she still met up with Logan? So many questions...read the story to find the answers!


Manticore Life – No Escape:

Manticore Life – No Escape:

(By Jules_Rox)

Chapter 1:

"Sir, it seems we have a problem." The young scientist said.

"And what might that be Ralph?" Asked Lydecker.

"The hacker wiped our records of the last 5 years, we lost all of our information." He told his boss, "The only way to regain the research is to perform the um, experiments all over again."

Lydecker noticed the hesitation before mentioning the 'experiments' and smirked before responding. "Then I guess there's only one thing we can do, we shall start tonight."Lydecker said to him, who also smiled a little. It was like they were grade-school kids who were in on some prank; of course, this was a tad more serious than writing on a desk.

"But won't that interfere with it's training?" questioned Ralph.

"Nah. It doesn't sleep. That's why I said we would be starting tonight. Go get it and I'll meet you in room 158"

"Yes sir, see you there." Ralph replied gratefully before he turned and left the office.

Meanwhile, 5-year-old Max was sitting on the edge of her bed. She had always hated after-hours or nighttime, it was so boring and lonely, but all that was about to change.

Dr. Grevens walked into the room and Max snapped to attention, she had been taught ever since she could stand on her own to do this with any-one who wasn't a G.E.P. (genetically enhanced prototype). "Follow me." He ordered quietly, not wanting to wake the others and cause any problems, he knew how attached they were to each other. Max knew that she could easily kill Dr. Grevens with her bare hands, but she knew the punishment for that type of behavior, so she silently obeyed him.

Max followed Dr. Grevens through the halls until they reached their destination. As they entered room 158, Max saw Lydecker waiting for them. Judging by the way there were no guards with him, Max began to wonder whether or not this was supposed to be happening. But she wasn't about to question Lydecker. That would be asking for trouble, so she remained silent, and just stood waiting to be briefed on what was going to happen.

Max never quite trusted Dr. Grevens, he acted more like a drill sergeant than a doctor, and he always pushed her so much farther than the others. 'He must have something against me.' She thought to herself, and it wasn't just a suspicion. He not only pushed her harder than the others, but he also treated her rougher than the others. It was like he expected more from her than he did from the others, but that couldn't be possible because she was just like the others. She knew all about how they came to be. Their mothers didn't want them, so they allowed their babies to be genetically enhanced before they were born, and sold them once they were. Simple enough, and since she had been given the same treatments as the others, she had to be just like them, right?

As all this was happening, a now 15-year-old Logan Cale was blowing out his birthday candles, unaware of the suffering going on in the corrupted world around him. Logan had grown up in a literal mansion, hired staff doing every-thing for him. He hadn't a worry in the world, except maybe for the homework he didn't finish, but trouble caused by that could easily be avoided with a simple excuse letter signed by either his mother or father. He ripped open his first gift, it was from his Uncle Jack, "A brand new laptop!" Logan breathed, he knew how hard it was to get one of these now days, and how much they cost, "Oh, thanks Uncle Jack!" he exclaimed, turning his ice blue eyes towards his chuckling Uncle long enough to show his gratitude, before moving on to the next gift. This one was even better (it was from his millionaire parents so of coarse it was!), it was a T.V./V.C.R. complete with a video recorder, the latest virtual reality game system, and the newest games on the market.

Chapter 2-

"Soldier, do you know why you have been brought here?" Lydecker asked Max.

"No sir."

"Is it any of your business to know why I brought you here?"

"No sir." Max answered in the same blank tone.

"Good, then I think you'll do well here." Lydecker stated more to himself then to Max. Then he turned around and walked out of the room, "Follow me!" he called out over his shoulder.

Dr. Grevens gathered together some papers, attached them to a clipboard, and marched out, Max following him wondering what was going on.

Lydecker led them to one of the many training arenas in the complex. Max however didn't recognize this particular arena, which was odd because she was sure she and her team had been trained all over the complex. 'I guess I was wrong.' Max thought dully.

"Jump over that wall now soldier." Lydecker said, pointing to a six-foot wall.

Max completed the task with ease, and jogged back to where Lydecker was standing. Dr. Grevens was standing next to him writing notes on his clipboard. "Now that one." Lydecker said, now pointing to an eight-footer.

Once again Max did it easily, and once again, Lydecker had her jump another wall, this one being two feet higher than the last. This continued until she had jumped a sixteen-foot wall, then Lydecker had her stop the wall jumping, and told her to run some laps while him and Dr. Grevens talked.

Once Max was out of earshot Lydecker turned to Dr. Grevens. "So… how'd it compare to the others?" he asked him.

Dr. Grevens grinned like a schoolboy, "Wonderfully, 332960073452's abilities are more than double that of the others. We really made it perfect Deck."

"Yeah well, when you get to start with a blob of ready to perfect cells instead of crack babies, you do tend to get better results." Lydecker smirked, and it was true. Max wasn't like the others, they all had biological mothers, who had sold them for nine months of food and shelter, and a couple of bucks, but Max was different.

The others were X-5s, and as far as Max and the others knew, that was a far as the experiments had gone, but they were wrong. The X-5s were flawed. Due to neurological cross wiring, they suffered seizures, so Lydecker decided to keep on trying to make a perfect soldier. The next few batches didn't work out, so when the X-9s were all born dead, Lydecker decided to take a new approach.

Instead of altering babies already in the womb, he took a bunch of DNA cells from various people and stuck them in a tube. He also mixed in animal DNA, such as cat DNA for agility, gorilla DNA for strength, shark DNA so that she didn't have to sleep, alligator DNA so that she could stay under water for a long time, and many more. But he didn't stop there, he altered her human genes for super fast reflexes, faster than the rest of the team, and she healed super fast. She was perfect in every way; she had even been made to be beautiful so that if needed, she could use seductive skills when she was older.

"Its perfect, perfect in every way possible Deck, you've really outdone yourself." Dr. Grevens said, making it sound like he had written a perfect report instead of building a perfect soldier.

"Yeah it is isn't it?" Lydecker responded, following Max with his eyes as she zoomed around them, non-stop, waiting to be told to stop.

"332960073452! Come over here!" Lydecker called out to Max, who immediately stopped running laps and jogged over to where he was.

"Yes sir?" she said.

"Soldier, what do you know of parents?" he asked her.

Max felt like she had had the wind knocked out of her. What did he mean? Parents? What were parents? She was scared, he had asked her a question, and she didn't know the answer to it.

"I…I don't understand sir." Max stuttered after a moment.

Lydecker was about to hit her for being ignorant, when he remembered that she hadn't ever even heard of parents. He had sometimes wondered if their supervisors had told them fairy-tales, but obviously she had never been told where she was from, and she had never wondered. Sure they knew about their surrogate mothers, but that was only because a doctor had once left an X-5's file in their barracks by mistake, and they had read it. "Right, forget about it, complete the obstacle course and then return to your barracks." He said before walking away from her. 'God dammit Deck! She's five years old, how can you do this?" Lydecker asked himself, before shaking those thoughts from his head and reminding himself that she was made for this, and would be fine.

Max stared up at the ten-foot wall, wondering what was on the other side. She had figured out that this course was made for them, but she was sure that they weren't supposed to be doing it yet, so why did Lydecker assign it to her?

Max cleared all thoughts from her head as she backed up, getting ready to jump the wall and face the course. She jumped the wall quite easily, and landed softly on the other side. There were ropes to climb, gaps to jump, and mud to wade through, but Max finished the course pretty fast, and went back to her barracks where she immediately walked into the bathroom to get showered.

Once she was washed and had changed her clothes (in other words 1-2 minutes later), Max emerged from the bathroom to find Zack staring at her. His look was odd, it was almost like he was jealous of her, why she could only guess. "Hey, I thought that you may want to see this." He said, tossing a file to her. Max opened the file and a single piece of paper fell to the ground. Max picked up the paper and read it.

It was her information sheet, but she could tell it was a copy because it was all written out in pen, like someone had hastily copied it out. The sheet gave simple facts like her barcode number, and her gender, but it also gave her group number, which wouldn't be weird at all if it had said X-5, but that was the thing, it didn't. It said X-11. "I don't get it." Max said simply.

"Your not like us Maxie, your not an X-5, your not my sister."

These last words hurt Max more than any drill instructor or doctor had. "No, it's not true!" Max exclaimed, "I am too your sister, we've gone through everything together!"

Zack glanced up into Max's eyes, and his anger all melted. She was hurt, and he had done that to her. He had hurt his baby sister. "Max, I'm sorry, I didn't mean that."

'It's ok." Max said, and even though her voice was soft, her eyes were hard, and her expression cold.

Zack sighed, he knew what he had said was harsh, and he hadn't meant it. It had just come out; he had a habit of doing that.


End file.
